Hyde5: Lance's 'weakness' quote latest sign Pacers are NBA's Jets

Lance Stephenson looks on after committing a foul in the third quarter.… (Jim Rassol / Sun Sentinel )

May 26, 2014|Dave Hyde

Are the Pacers the Jets of the NBA? Have they put their mouths where their games can't take them? You have to wonder with Lance Stephenson making the latest entry in the All-Presumption Quote List the team has formed in the last few years.

On Sunday, Stephenson said it was, "a sign of weakness," that LeBron James engaged in trash-talking with him during Saturday's Game 3. You have to salute him for giving his real thoughts, because most players would have said something about it just being two players competing or, as LeBron did, that he wasn't going to make it a storyline.

You also have to agree with this thought: Stephenson did get in LeBron's head during the second quarter. Or maybe Stephenson's game did. He had eight points and nine rebounds at halftime of Game 3. But after LeBron took him on, Stephenson's game disappeared. He had just two points and two rebounds in the second half.

That should have been the over-riding point of LeBron engaging Stephenson: How the Pacers guard wilted in the aftermath and LeBron helped the Heat win Game 3. Instead, Stephenson turned it into a strange affair where he got the better of LeBron despite losing the game.

"To me, I think it's a sign of weakness because he never used to say nothing to me," Stephenson said of LeBron's quotes. "I always used to be the one who used to be the one that say, 'I'm going to get under you. I'm going to do something to get you mad' Now he's trying to do it to me. I feel like it's a weakness."

Yep, it's more sign The Pacers are the Jets - a team that talks a lot without a signature win to back up their words. Here are the Pacers' top five quotes the past few years:

1. "They're the biggest flopping team in the NBA,'' coach Frank Vogel before the 2012 playoff series agains the Heat.

2. "See you in the Finals,'' center Roy Hibbert in a tweet to Portland's LaMarcus Aldridge this past December.

3. "It's what we do as a team that will separate me and make me the MVP,'' Paul George said to radio host Jim Rome in a bit of passive-aggressiveness with team-based humility and personal glory.

4. "I guess they don't have an answer,'' Hibbert on his big numbers against the Heat.

And now ...

5. "I think it's a sign of weakness,'' Stephenson on LeBron engaging him in Game 3.

Say this for the Pacers: They've provided the one thing the Heat needs. The issue with the Heat on this attempt for a third straight title was human condition and motivation. The Pacers have provided motivation not just before the series but now in the middle of it.